Ancestry’s free news article collection
Ancestry is often the company genealogists love to hate.
Along with every other subscriber, The Legal Genealogist would note that — sigh — it’s expensive.
It’s often unresponsive to concerns.
It makes changes to things that don’t need to be changed and doesn’t fix things that do need to be changed.
And did I mention expensive?
Yeah, all that.
And then…
And then…
It takes the lead on a project like this one. Releasing the ability to search thousands of newspaper articles with potential details about enslaved ancestors — and to read and even download the articles — for free.1
And here, on Juneteenth 2024, it’s a treasure trove for descendants of the enslaved — and of the enslavers.
Announced just a week ago, the Articles of Enslavement collection is a “new collection of newspaper articles containing details on more than 183,000 formerly enslaved people. The new collection will help descendants of previously enslaved people in the U.S. discover more about their families. They also serve as an important resource for understanding the forced movement of enslaved people in the United States and the actions that they took to seek freedom.”2
It’s here that we can learn about 23-year-old Lewis, claimed by a man named Wilks near Henderson, Texas, and Phillip, age 40, claimed by E. Pallitt of Smith County, Texas, reported in the jail of Henderson County on the 10th of April 1865.3
And it’s where we find out about the planned sale of Ianna, age 28, and her children — two-year-old Calvin and an unnamed infant girl. “Sold as the property of the minors of James F. Montgomery.”4
And about Priscilla Richard, aged 15-16 years, who had run away from Cotton Cameron in Columbia County, Pennsylvania, in 1829. 5
Now… to use this collection, we do need an Ancestry account, but we don’t need a paid account. Just sign up for a free account and that’s enough. Then the first time you do a search in this collection, you’ll probably be asked to link your Ancestry account to a Newspapers.com account — and that’s free as well. Once you do that, you’ll be able to download and save collection articles, all for free.
Heartbreaking… amazing… free.
Spend some time with this collection today.
For Juneteenth.6
Cite/link to this post: Judy G. Russell, “For Juneteenth, the articles of enslavement,” The Legal Genealogist (https://www.legalgenealogist.com/blog : posted 19 June 2024).
SOURCES
- “Articles of Enslavement,” Ancestry.com (https://www.ancestry.com : accessed 19 June 2024). ↩
- Bethany Bell, “Navigating the New Articles of Enslavement Collection,” Ancestry blog, posted 11 June 2024 (https://blogs.ancestry.com/ : accessed 19 June 2024). ↩
- “Runaways,” (Marshall) Texas Republican, 2 June 1865, p. 2, col. 7; digital images, Newspapers.com (https://www.newspapers.com/ : accessed 19 June 2024). ↩
- “Guardian’s Sale Postponed,” Daily Constitutionalist and Republic, Augusta, Ga., p. 4, col. 6; digital images, Newspapers.com (https://www.newspapers.com/ : accessed 19 June 2024). ↩
- “6 Cents Reward,” Williamsport (Pa.) Sun-Gazette, p. 4, col. 4; digital images, Newspapers.com (https://www.newspapers.com/ : accessed 19 June 2024). ↩
- See “History of Juneteenth,” Juneteenth.com (https://www.juneteenth.com/ : accessed 19 June 2024). ↩
